Here, with them: Batman in Arkham Asylum
by Dragon'sSocks
Summary: Imagine Batman at his sunset, ill, slightly insane, too old to serve justice, but too dangerous to stay among common people of Gotham. So he is locked in the only place that seems to suit him, Arkham Asylum, with all his "good friends"…
1. Chapter 1: Cat

I was always fascinated by how thin is the line between Batman and his villains. So I wanted to try to describe what alternative future may wait for Batman. Sad revelations, different perspective, sorrow for what was lost… I honestly tried to find anyone who used a similar concept, but I didn't succeed. If anyone can help me, please, send it over. I would love to read it!

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Slightly limping with her left leg, she puts a chair in front of me and blows a puff of smoke into my face.

Her cheekbones are dreadful, so sharp that they seem to tear her skin.

Her left hand is hanging next to her torso in some unusual manner as if disfigured by unknown forces.

"Hugo," she comments, catching my stare, "It was supposed to be cat's claw", she puts out her cigarette into a sleeve of the robe, "Not all experiments end well, you know."

Her breath smells like cheap cigarettes and freshly boiled mint. I grimace eagerly catching every part of it.

I stare at her.

There is a lot of moonlight today. Moonlight on walls, on door, in her black hair, slightly grayish black hair.

"I know I look sick," she continues. I don't say anything, but she does look sick. Her porcelain skin is tired and stretches as an old bed sheet when she smiles .

"You are as talkative as ever, Bat," she lights another cigarette. "Want some? I don't think you ever smoked. I didn't think that I would as well. But there is not much to do in this shithole."

Smoke covers her image. It becomes so blurry that my memory shows me red goggles and red lipstick. I gasp. I feel that my mask is on as well, I feel it wrapped around my head, I feel elastic leather on my neck, I feel it covering my forehead and nose. I straighten. Batman doesn't slouch, he never hunches. I feel as if the power comes back to my hands, I feel it overwhelms me, getting me drunk and short breath.

My eyes are wet from cold Gotham air and sticky fog. The fog with a shape of a woman in a black leather costume who says "meow" and teases me into darkness.

Her warm lips on my chin, her soft breast next to my chest, her "bat" in my ears.

Smoke disappears… This middle aged woman looks at me astonished, excited. The chair under her is leaned to me and she is pressing her hand to my chest to keep a balance. Her good leg is stretched with almost forgotten cat instincts trying to steady her fall. Her lips are parted, wet, welcoming… and her eyes … I remember those eyes. The most beautiful, the most poisonous color of green.

"Cat…," I whisper, feeling how power is leaving me, how my shoulders are falling, how cold sweat appears on my forehead with medication kicking in.

She leans back, touches her leg. I bet it didn't have any physical exercises for some time.

She takes a cigarette out and then puts it back in. Her hand touches her hair messing it. I hear a quiet laugh before she looks back at me.

"It was good, Bat. Let's repeat it some time," she licks her lips and put the chair back to its place.

When she leaves, I feel as broken as ever. I barely have any energy to drag my old body to the bed.

My thoughts get cloudy, slow. I don't sleep, I am in a comatose of all the pills that they squeezed into me, but through it, somehow, I see one image over and over. A woman with a heavy walk leaving my room. The door is closing and I see her looking at me. Her eyes are as alive as ever.


	2. Chapter 2: Bane

Her red hair was kindly gathered into a long braid.

"It doesn't talk to me much these days," she pulled a pot closer to her.  
"There is nothing in it, " I noticed looking at the ground without anything green in it.

A common room was full of slightly hysterical murmur. It was as aggressive as this pot with the ground in Ivy's hands.

"It is there. It just doesn't talk to me," she complained persistently and her hands started to shake.

I shook my head giving up.

"Don't ….bother … her. She … will cry all… night," a heavy voice was mixed with deep breathing.

An oxygen cylinder attached to his wheelchair made it look like a funny rocket from summer circus festivals.

"I … can't sleep…when she ..cries. Good… thing…crazy one…is in the solitary…at least."

"Harleen, " Ivy started sobbing.

Bane rolled his eyes. He wore an oxygen reservoir that didn't look as menacing as his old mask. This one just made him look sick.

His wheelchair was doing a soft screeching sound when he wheeled to her. He laid his hand on her shoulder. Ivy stopped sobbing and looked at him, puzzled, but not scared.

"It talks….This place…is…noisy. You…can't hear it," he said taking off his mark one more time.

She started nodding and it even seemed that color appeared on her fallen cheeks.

She turned back to her pot and started singing gently stroking brown ceramics.

Bane wheeled to the window and I wandered after him.

"Are…you..hunting me?" he asked chuckling darkly.  
"No, though it would have felt nice… You don't look so good, Bane"  
"I don't feel… good..either," he put back his mark. He started to catch his breath leaning forward slightly.

I politely turned around looking at the shadows of the people next to me.  
"I didn't know you had a soft side for Poison Ivy," I noticed.  
"I didn't… have it. One grows… to be …merciful here."  
"Bane, you killed hundreds of people," I stated grimly.  
"Not here…"  
I looked at the profile of his face. He was old. When did he become so old? I remembered a muscled mastermind that held Gotham in terror. He wasn't scary anymore. I think his own spine was broken. I wondered how it happened.  
While I was doing it, I noticed a pigeon that sat on the windowsill outside the bars.  
A thin hand of Bane stretched out and carefully reached to the cage. He had something in his hand.  
A silly bird didn't fly away and when something similar to breadcrumbs fell out of Bane's hand, it even came closer.

Bane smiled.

"It doesn't change the past," I persisted with coldness in my voice. "It doesn't make you a better person."  
"It doesn't… make me…. worse."  
The bird continued eating and Bane smiled again when its feathered head accidentally touched his finger.  
I wanted to feel rage, hatred, vengefulness, but this old man was no Bane.  
In these walls everything became too grey, not white, not black, just a thousand shades of pavement grey.


End file.
